Xarxa Llegim en Parella (Reading in Pairs Network) schools in Catalonia

Peer learning: when the schools are the peers

Recently, it has been frequently remarked how the peer interaction - understanding peers as persons who occupy a similar social status - properly organised, can produce learning. We have talked about peer learning - when peers are students - referring to teamwork in which students learn from the support offered (because teaching is a good way of learning) and the one received from their peers. We can also talk about peer learning, referring to teachers who work in teams - including working in pairs - and reflect on their practices as a mechanism for professional development. In a similar way, in a more general level, we could say that the interactions between schools can also offer opportunities for learning. There is a growing experience on how teachers from different schools, who share interests or challenges, are coordinated to complete, within their respective school practices, actions that are accompanied by the experiences of other schools. A good way of addressing the school change, the introduction and maintenance of innovative practices, can be supported (by experience, shared resources, helps, and so on) by teachers from other schools, who solve similar problems.

Llegim en parella (Reading in pairs): a peer tutoring program to improve reading comprehension

Llegim en parella (Reading in pairs) is an educational programme, created by the Grup de Recerca d’Aprenentatge entre iguals (Research Group on Peer Learning) of the Institut de Ciències de l’Educació (Institute of the Science Education) of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) in Catalonia. This programme is characterised by three main components: peer tutoring, the involvement of the families with the school from home and the reading (Duran, 2007).

Peer tutoring is the first component of the programme. Although is not very well known and not a common practice in Catalonia, peer tutoring is a method of cooperative learning that is recognised by educational experts as a highly effective practice to promote inclusive education (Topping, 2000). It consists in creating pairs of students, with different degrees of competence curriculum, in which each member of the pair develops a role (tutor or tutee) to achieve greater degrees of learning. The tutor learns teaching and the tutee learns, thanks to the permanent assistance and adjusted help offered his peer tutor. In order to convert the interactions in a learning context, the teacher should plan very carefully the relationship within pairs, using material which able to promote a structure but gradually can transfer to the pairs of students the decisions related to adjustments of the proposed activities and design, by the tutors, of new teaching materials.

The second element of the programme relates to the involvement of the families with the school tasks from home. The family involvement to assist learning from home has a positive influence on school performance, not only for the support received by students directly from their families, but above all, the continuity that students perceive between the educational objectives among the school and the family. The programme structures the interaction among parents and children, giving them resources to assist their learning with the support of specific materials.

Regarding to the third component, the reading competence, Llegim en parella, creates situations of genuine reading comprehension, presenting authentic texts which students can find daily in their life. The texts are selected with three criteria: variety of formats, level of complexity (slightly above the general level of reading comprehension of the tutee students) and interesting content with unity of meaning by themselves. The activity sheets serve as a sample to facilitate the creation of new ones for their peer tutees.

The development of the programme is structured in several phases which, at times, are carried out simultaneously: creation of pairs and previous training of students and families, peer tutoring sessions (in the school and the family home) and evaluation.

In order to arrange the pairing, we suggest using a reading comprehension test or to use the data that teachers have available to match the students with different levels of reading skills. Some schools match students who are in the same class, taking advantage of the differences that naturally exist there; in others, they make the pairs using students from different ages and grades where the older ones become tutors. Once the pairs are organised, students receive an accurate initial training according to their specific role with the aim to: develop the role that has been assigned, learn about the specifics of the work that they will need to do; finally, get to know the materials that they are going to use to achieve the basic skills. At the same time, the initial training with the families starts, too, but in a more condensed way.

Once the training is finished, the sessions of peer tutoring starts. The program proposes two 30-minute weekly sessions during 12 weeks (one term). Each 30-minute meeting follows a specific structure: first, the pairs read aloud (starting with some previous activities) using the reading technique PPP or Pause, Prompt and Praise (Whendall and Colmar, 1990); activities are solved after the reading comprehension and, finally, when the text is being fully understood, the session finishes with an expressive reading. Additionally, there is the possibility to do complementary activities related to the themes read on that session. Fortnightly, each pair spent the last few minutes of the session making a self-assessment of the work process and the progress being made.

The assessment of the students’ progress is carried out through different instruments: an initial assessment and final (comprehension test), pair self-evaluation template, teacher observations template, the activities completed during the sessions, the activities sheets created by the tutors and information from the family tutoring.

In summary, the program aims, as a starting point, to provide materials to facilitate the introduction of cooperative learning, in this case peer tutoring, as an inclusive methodology that understands the diversity as a positive element; to develop new teaching didactics for learning Catalan; to improve the reading skills of the student, especially the comprehension; to promote the students’ cooperation capacity or teamwork; and to enhance the involvement of families in the school, offering the possibility to act as reading tutors of their sons or daughters at home.

For all the reasons presented, the programme is an educational innovation that requires significant support of the teachers involved.

The Llegim en parella Network: schools that assist each other in an educational innovation

The need of giving support to the teaching involved it is the main reason why during the academic year 2006-07 the network of schools was created with the aim of collaborating and facilitating mutual support for the implementation of the programme; to ensure a certain level of success that would allow sustainable innovation or the possibility of going one step forward and having it incorporated into the repertoire of the school usual performances.

Networking allows teachers to find spaces where they can see themselves as creators of knowledge who experience, evaluate and disseminate innovative experiences, promoting change in education (Fernandez, 2007).

The Llegim en parella Network counts with different schools, in addition to the Riera de Ribes Primary School, the Escola Bergantí Primary School, Jaume I High School, Sagrat Cor Primary School, Antoni Grau Minguell Primary School and Jacint Verdaguer High School. All of them were schools that participated in cooperative learning training courses and, before starting the programme, all the principals of each school showed commitment to facilitate participation in the network of two teachers, with the compromise that if the result was positive, the innovation could became part of the proceedings of the school.

The face-to-face meetings and the virtual classroom of the network

The Llegim en parella Network combines face to face encounters with a stable coordination through a virtual classroom at the University of Barcelona. Three face-to-face sessions were carried out during the academic year 2006-07; one in each term. The aim of these meetings was to share the implementation, the development and the ending of the programme with all the schools participating in the project.

In the first meeting, besides the personal presentations, the session was focused on introducing the programme and the materials. The materials were given to each representative of the schools (an article describing the programme, a power point presentation, a DVD and material to work in the classroom), asking to all them to use the package in an adjusted and appropriate way regarding the specific characteristics and needs of the students in their classrooms. It is not a matter of implementing a programme, thus it’s important to implement it in a creatively and adjusted way to the context and needs.

Precisely for this reason, an introduction to the conceptual foundations of the programme was given (peer tutoring, family involvement and reading skills), because it’s important to understand well the principles on which the educational innovation rests in order to make the necessaries adjustments. Having prior knowledge of the programme (for the previous reading of an article in which the foundation and functioning is explained), in this first meeting some first doubts related to the practical action emerged. At that time already started collaborative work among the schools, all offering assistance in resolving problems together. For example, a secondary school teacher was inquiring about how they could actually invite families to participate in the programme, to which some schools presented consolidated experience with family involvement.

A part from being able to share the doubts during the three meetings, a forum within the virtual classroom was created, in which participants offered support to each other in anticipating problems at every stage of the innovation. "Our doubt is how to create pairs if the number of students in the classroom is odd," is an example of questions that generated a debate that helped to build sophisticated and effective solutions.

The Virtual classroom, with the function of maintaining constant contact among the schools involved in the network, was a space useful and beneficial to promote communication, the sharing and the answering of any doubts that were emerging on the daily basis and to facilitate the availability of all the materials and documents necessary for the implementation of the programme to all participants. The advantages offered by this type of communication are obvious: possibilities of instant communication among all participants, facilitating the consultation of all events and meetings convened. In some cases, not being used to work with the tool, created initially less involvement than expected and needed, but gradually was overcome.

The goal of the second meeting was to share the experience of the stage where each school was situated, using a template that included the main elements of the implementation. The richest part was starting to pick up the doubts, problems or difficulties that each school was finding in the process of launching the programme. For example, adjustments to the vulnerable pupils, the role of the teachers in the peer tutoring session, adjustments of the activities sheets and schedules of observation and monitoring, support for families in the role of reading tutor, the possibility that in some cases children acts as tutors of his parents ... Here appeared authentic episodes of peer learning, where schools showed how they had overcome the same difficulties were concern to give support to others to solve problems that they already had.

During the development of the programme a visit was organized in order to learn from others in the classroom. Each teacher went to visit a peer teacher in a different school, during working sessions, using a template to observe the session. During these visits we could discuss with teachers the implementation and monitoring of the programme, the strong and weak points, the doubts and difficulties which were well served by making a first pick-up of the observations and assessments of teachers responsible.

The goal of the third meeting was to assess the results and plan for continuity, in order to help to implement a sustainable innovation in the school. During the first part, the teachers were interviewed with the aim to assess the degree of satisfaction and to find elements to improve the programme. The structure of these interviews was very similar to the questionnaire that teachers used with pupils and families involved in the Llegim en parella in their respective schools. These data, together with others such of the reading comprehension test and reading image are part of a research on the programme, the results of which were presented to schools at each stage.

In part two of the last session, the various proposals for improvement made by schools were  discuss, covering items such as calendar, evaluation, the revision of teaching materials developed by the tutors and above all, the organizational aspects that  involved the maintenance of the project. In this sense, it is fair to say that all schools expressed the willingness to continue the project following the course they asked the possibility of maintaining the network.

The network today

In the current course, 2007-08, the initial schools of the Llegim en parella Network continue running the programme, and in all cases but one, all the teachers involved where different from the ones involved during the first year. This was a necessary element for the innovation to avoid any action associated with some specific teachers, in order to become a project undertaken by the school. The new teachers have joined the network, but, with support from the teachers who were working with the Llegim en parella in the pass.

But, in addition, the network has grown with new schools: Pau Casals Primary School, Sant Jordi Primary School and Vedruna Primary School, which will allow the peer learning within the project to be richer because the network will count with different degrees of expertise. In this sense, each team of teachers in each school receives a visit and makes a visit to one another centre. Our teachers know that teaching is a good way of learning. Therefore, when schools act as tutors to the new teachers arriving (offering support, resources and materials) will have the chance to improve their own teaching performance.

References

Duran, D and Oller, M (2006). ‘La participació de les famílies en un programa de tutoria entre iguals per a la millora de la competència lectora’. In Suports. Revista Catalana d’Educació Inclusiva, 10 (29), pp.74-81.
Duran, D (2007). ‘Llegim en parella, un programa de tutoria entre iguals, amb alumnes i famílies, per a la millora de la competència lectora’. In Articles. Revista de didàctica de la llengua, 42, pp.85-99.
Fernández, M (2007). ‘Redes para la innovación educativa’. In Cuadernos de Pedagogía, 374, pp.26-30.
Topping, K (2000). Tutoring by peers, family and volunteers. Geneve. UNESCO.
Whendall, K And Colmar, S (1990). ‘Peer tutoring in low-progress readers using pause, prompt and praise’. In Foot, H, Morgan, M and Shute, R, Children helping children. Chichester, John Wiley and Sons.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Ms Silvia Blanch, Mr David Duran and Ms Marta Flores Departament de Psicologia de l'Educació, in Facultat de Ciències de l'Educació, Departament de Psicologia de l'Educació, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (Spain).

 

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